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5 teenage hackers who hacked their way to notoriety

A Black Hat logo shines from the stage at a major cyber security conference in Las Vegas in Aug. We detailed a list of young hackers who made a name for themselves for their cyber security attacks. PHOTO: AFP

Police arrested a 15-year-old boy in Northern Ireland on Monday (Oct 26) over a cyber attack that may have led to the theft of data from among the 4 million customers of British broadband provider TalkTalk, reported Reuters.

TalkTalk's login page on its web site in October 26, 2015. PHOTO: REUTERS

The attack, which took place last Wednesday (Oct 21), prompted the company to deny accusations of laxity and defend its security by saying that theirs was “head and shoulders” above that of their competitors.

TalkTalk said the attack was not as serious as first feared after a ransom demand was received last Friday (Oct 23),

They did not believe that those behind the attacks would be able to steal money from its customers.

London’s Metropolitan Police, whose cyber-crime unit has been investigating the attack, confirmed that they had arrested a 15-year-old boy on suspicion of Computer Misuse Act Offences.

This is not the first time that teenagers have made the news for hacking. Here are more examples of teenagers going wild on computer networks.

Istana hacker

Melvin Teo Boon Wei leaving the State Courts on 4 August 2014. He was given 12 months' probation. PHOTO: ST FILE

In 2014, Singaporean student Melvin Teo Boon Wei, was given 12 months' probation after he was convicted of unauthorised use of a computer service by hacking into the Istana website.

The then 18-year-old had used a cross-site scripting (XSS) attack to gain unauthorised access to the servers hosting the Istana's website on Nov 8, 2013, reported The Straits Times.

He then hacked the site to display the words "Melvin Teo For The Win!" with two drawings of himself and some Chinese characters.

He was the second person that year to be convicted of the same crime.

Delson Moo Hiang Kng, 43, was fined $8,000 for conducting a similar attack on the Istana's website.

Melvin Teo Boon Wei

Melvin Teo Boon Wei

Melvin Teo Boon Wei

Hack for grades

Daniel Soares walking out of the courtroom. PHOTO: FACEBOOK/CBS NEWS

Three 17-year-old students were charged in court last Wednesday (Oct 21) after hacking into their school's computers to change their grades and class schedules.

Daniel Soares, Alex Mosquera and Erick Vaysman from Long Island, New York are facing prison time for their offence.

Of the three, Police labelled Soares as the "mastermind" because he physically broke into his school and installed a key logging device to collect logins and passwords remotely, reported CBS News.

Soares faces up to seven years' jail for his crimes while Mosquera and Vaysman face lesser charges because they did not participate in breaking into the school, reported News.com.au.

CBS reported that Mosquera and Vaysman had solicited Soares for favours.

Detective Sergeant John Best of the Suffolk County Police Department said they believed Soares changed his score from a 94 to a perfect score of a hundred.

"Cracka" the hacker

CIA Director John Brennan as he speaks at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. A teenage hacker had allegedly broken into his personal e-mail account and obtained personal data. PHOTO: AFP

The FBI and US Secret Service have opened criminal inquiries into the hacking of a private e-mail account used by Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director John Brennan and his family, the FBI said last Thursday (Oct 22).

The investigations followed the posting on social media earlier by the hackers known only as "Crackas With Attitude" about the data stolen from an AOL account, reported Reuters.

Online magazine, Motherboard, spoke to one of the alleged hackers, "Cracka", who claimed to be a 13-year-old student.